Honkai Impact 3rd, a simulator of lifelong regret!

……

If Alicia's significance to the boy is clear, then Vilvie's significance to him is actually hard to see. She's like a simple simp, only she succeeded, and she's more capable than most simps.

But in reality, the meaning of life for this gentle yet introverted girl is gradual.

There seems to be nothing special about him, but the traces of that girl are everywhere in his life, and he unintentionally became a useless person who cannot live without her.

True loss is not like fireworks, dazzling and announcing its existence to the whole world.

The real loss is when you realize that every moment of your life, every detail of hers, is there, yet you can no longer see her.

Ok……

It seems he's really about to die.

Jiang Cheng even saw pink lights through the window. The sky, which should have been pitch black, was now falling like shooting stars. Even calling it a hallucination caused by retinal malfunction before death seemed too bizarre.

For some reason, it reminds me of Alicia.

Even though the girl's figure was already blurred, and even though he couldn't see the shadow of light, she was separated from him by an unknown distance.

Since leaving that birthday party, he has never seen that girl again. She can only be remembered endlessly in his memories, and his life with Wilvi has become blurred, to the point that he has completely forgotten her.

If it weren't for the fact that Velvi died completely, the name Alicia would probably have disappeared from memory one day.

What did I delete—the decorations, or my past self?

Ugh……

……

I hope Virvi won't blame me.

The girl was clearly the one most afraid of being alone, and she had made a promise to never be apart, yet she was left alone buried underground for so long.

That's it.

I've done everything I could. Staying any longer will only make me a shadow of my former self, blurring even the precious memories I hold dear, and causing me to forget everything I truly fought for and everything that was real.

That's enough.

Whether the starry sky is real or not, being able to see a beautiful scene like a paradise before death could perhaps be interpreted as Virvi waiting for him.

Let's make the most of our last moments and enjoy it to the fullest.

……

Jiang Cheng looked up at the starry sky.

At that moment, Jiangcheng saw a shooting star.

One, two, three, four... then many tiny, dazzling, flickering lights, and finally, a magnificent burst of light tore through the night, leaving only a pink line drawing the dividing line in the darkness.

--meteor.

This is nothing particularly unusual.

Although large meteors only occur once every few decades or even centuries, small meteors are not difficult to find if the requirements are not that high.

In a world where technology has advanced to this level, one can even continuously observe the wonders of the starry sky without needing a first-person perspective.

Essentially, it is the light trail produced by the electron transition of a meteoroid traveling in interstellar space being attracted by Earth's gravity as it passes through the atmosphere at high speed.

It is not as eternal as the stars, nor as ancient as the sun, nor as numerous as the stars, and even if it gives its all, it cannot reach the brightness of the moon. Yet it is willing to burn itself out, flashing a light that tears the sky apart in its fleeting moment of brilliance.

But no matter how rapidly technology advances, no matter how much it diminishes the miracles of the past.

Because this is...

—Meteor shower.

A sudden meteor shower is a beauty beyond human reach; it is a gift from distant stars who willingly burn everything to achieve it.

No matter how common something may seem, when combined, it becomes a true miracle.

At this moment, the boy who raised his head had his clear, dark brown eyes reflected in the endless, deep night sky. The burning meteoroid, with its pink tail flame, released light freely in the unobstructed sliver of the sky.

The endless night seemed to be divided by the power of the stars, with the two halves of the clouds tacitly using the pink shooting star, which was still falling downwards, as the dividing line.

Even the bright full moon is able to show its fullness, no longer covered or obscured by anything, its light both cold and warm.

The stars and the moon complement each other, and under the full moon, pink shooting stars twinkle as they fall—there are almost no words to describe this scene.

Only the purest fairy tales, fairy tales unbound by any common sense, fairy tales that exist only in the mouths of children, can describe them.

[On that day, He fell from the sky. People looked up and saw the starry sky.]

[The stars and moon sent forth the daughter of God, who desires to become humanity's companion.]

[The long wind becomes her chariot, the four seas become her garden. Birds bring seeds of goodness, and a hundred flowers weave hymns of love.]

The sound of an unnamed, beautiful poem echoed in my ears, as if praising a young girl who had finally cast aside all hesitation and made up her mind to go to paradise.

Is this the paradise that Alicia has always been searching for?

No wonder they can even ignore themselves.

so good……

Jiang Cheng reached out his hand towards the starlight, just as he had extended an invitation to the girl in the forest at the very beginning, only this time his voice had changed...

"Hello……"

"Goodbye."

"—Alicia."

……

Your simulation has ended.

The great are bound by the insignificant, the noble perish in the base—this is, in reality, the norm for humanity… this nascent civilization. Every seemingly beautiful beginning ends in an even more repulsive ugliness.

Humanity lost Vervie, but gained a genius imitator, Jiang Cheng.

[You did everything that Spiral Hero should have done, and even laid the groundwork in a better and more perfect way.]

The so-called Heroic Spiral has displayed its talent in a more refined form.

【perhaps……】

Perhaps humanity's fate will be better than it was before.

It doesn't matter to you anymore. In pulling others out of the abyss, you unknowingly step into it yourself. Or perhaps, only those already in the abyss can pull others out.

Your life ended too abruptly. If you had continued, perhaps you could have replaced that young girl as a hero, a true leader of humanity, rather than the scholar in history books who died young and was lamented.

【this……】

Is it really worth it?

【--worth.】

Even if you were qualified to inherit everything from the girl, to become the second Helix, and could easily live to the end of the world under Möbius's surgery, wouldn't you regret ending your life so hastily, being easily burned away, leaving only white ashes?

【--Won't.】

[Would you be saddened by not being able to see your loved ones one last time?]

【…】

When someone you love cries or is sad, do you shed tears too?

【…】

Have you ever wondered—if I possessed greater power, the ability to rewrite everything, could I change this tragic ending? Could I avert the tragedy? Create a paradise where everyone can smile...?

【…】

[If you knew that you could summon the Spiral Heroes simply by avoiding the girl, then the Honkai wouldn't have been amplified by the fully-formed Velvet, and both Blanca and Velvet could have escaped unscathed.]

[Mebius wouldn't lose everything so quickly, nor would he go almost completely insane—would you still accept the girl's invitation to your birthday party, and show that smile that lonely, withdrawn girl had never seen before?]

【…】

[CG generation in progress...]

The image freezes instantly as the text appears on the virtual screen.

[These are excerpts from two different scenes: a boy collapsed on the ruins and a girl beneath them; a boy facing death alone in his room and a shooting star falling outside his window.]

The expression on his face was unknown; the only clear feature was the boy, like a high-definition figure inserted into a simple line drawing, inexplicably jarring.

[Obtained via CG.]

[Unlock the simulated ending branch—The Birth of Tragedy.]

[The simulation is currently in the process of settling accounts and is not yet complete. Please wait patiently for it to finish.]

Jiang Cheng was somewhat relieved that the only high-definition and clear image in the CG image in front of him was himself; the girl was still buried under the ruins and covered by dust.

He had promised Vilvie that he would never investigate her appearance after death. The girl should be given some private time. She would feel embarrassed if her unattractive appearance was seen by someone she liked.

It would be terrible to see it for that reason.

"tragedy."

Jiang Cheng murmured the word softly, but his brows furrowed unconsciously.

"Why 'birth'?"

The tragedy is understandable, because this simulation was a complete tragedy.

Because of information blockage, because of insufficient time, because of the sudden disaster, because of the foreshadowing that led to the inevitable disaster.

—Why is it called birth?

The word "birth" is synonymous with "beginning" or "start."

The simulation has ended, so why did the tragedy begin?